Book contents
- History in the Humanities and Social Sciences
- History in the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- 1 Law and History, History and Law
- 2 History, Law and the Rediscovery of Social Theory
- 3 The Uses of History in the Study of International Politics
- 4 International Relations Theory and Modern International Order: The Case of Refugees
- 5 The Delphi Syndrome: Using History in the Social Sciences
- 6 Power in Narrative and Narratives of Power in Historical Sociology
- 7 History and Normativity in Political Theory: The Case of Rawls
- 8 Political Philosophy and the Uses of History
- 9 The Relationship between Philosophy and its History
- 10 When Reason Does Not See You: Feminism at the Intersection of History and Philosophy
- 11 On (Lost and Found) Analytical History in Political Science
- 12 Making History: Poetry and Prosopopoeia
- 13 Reloading the British Romantic Canon: The Historical Editing of Literary Texts
- 14 Economics and History: Analysing Serfdom
- 15 The Return of Depression Economics: Paul Krugman and the Twenty-First-Century Crisis of American Democracy
- 16 Anthropology and the Turn to History
- Index
- References
8 - Political Philosophy and the Uses of History
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 December 2022
Book contents
- History in the Humanities and Social Sciences
- History in the Humanities and Social Sciences
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- 1 Law and History, History and Law
- 2 History, Law and the Rediscovery of Social Theory
- 3 The Uses of History in the Study of International Politics
- 4 International Relations Theory and Modern International Order: The Case of Refugees
- 5 The Delphi Syndrome: Using History in the Social Sciences
- 6 Power in Narrative and Narratives of Power in Historical Sociology
- 7 History and Normativity in Political Theory: The Case of Rawls
- 8 Political Philosophy and the Uses of History
- 9 The Relationship between Philosophy and its History
- 10 When Reason Does Not See You: Feminism at the Intersection of History and Philosophy
- 11 On (Lost and Found) Analytical History in Political Science
- 12 Making History: Poetry and Prosopopoeia
- 13 Reloading the British Romantic Canon: The Historical Editing of Literary Texts
- 14 Economics and History: Analysing Serfdom
- 15 The Return of Depression Economics: Paul Krugman and the Twenty-First-Century Crisis of American Democracy
- 16 Anthropology and the Turn to History
- Index
- References
Summary
The chapter begins by tracing the rise of the so-called ‘historicist’ approach to the study of texts in political philosophy. The example of Thomas Hobbes’s philosophy is discussed in such a way as to illustrate what is distinctive about the historicist approach. The chapter then turns to consider two objections frequently raised against this approach. One claims that ‘a tyranny of history’ has been allowed to develop, which has had the effect of cutting off the study of legal and political philosophy from a usable part. The other maintains that historicists fail to appreciate that some claims about political phenomena are transhistorical and universal in scope. After considering and largely rejecting these arguments, the chapter ends by examining the more recent objection that the history of political philosophy as currently written is an unduly parochial discipline, which now needs to concentrate on developing a more global approach. The chapter concludes with an assessment of this so-called global turn.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- History in the Humanities and Social Sciences , pp. 194 - 210Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022
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